The Observations of Penny
by Toss Me Away
Summary: 'My apartment doesn't have avian creatures, therefore it isn't my apartment, and I'm staying here till it turns back to my apartment.' A slightly different viewpoint: Penny watches, and notes in her mind. Friend Fic.
1. Chapter 1: Observations of Penny

The observations of Penny. (if taken, then Matchmaking Penny?)

disclaimer: TBBT, not mine.

*note: not all in this piece of fiction will comply with the official plot. Timelines be damned. This is, after all is said and done, a piece of 'fan fiction'; which implies a certain amount of delusion and fantasizing on the characters. If you really want to correct me, just leave a review and if I find it significant enough to change and does not alter the overall plot, I'll change it. And if it's just some tiny thing please don't ask me to change it. I'll likely end up spending my time making changes rather than writing the next chapter if I were to do that.

Penny graduated high-school and continued to college (majoring in performing arts or something)- up to the third semester, before of going off with her bf to chase her dreams. Does she end up any different?

Part One

i

From the first time Penny met those two guys across her apartment, she'd been playing with Leonard. He likes how she looks, unlike the lanky guy next to him. (A short bespectacled guy like that, why wouldn't he?) Judging from the shirt the lanky one was wearing, he was probably a kid in a man's body. It explains the lack of sexual interest he had towards her. Although he was strangely trying to impress her as well, maybe because he could or his pride made him do it. Men and their pride…

_Mental sigh. _

She smiled at the thought of having two more friends she could be with. Living alone was so overrated. Screw independence. These two look like they need a free spirit to light up their little corner in the world. If there's some space for this little firecracker, and she likes being with them, why not? Having a guy who liked her was a plus and it reaffirmed her place in the world. That tall lanky one might not be so hot with her, but that can change with time. She just has to know what sort of person he'd be fine with, and see if she's okay with what he is.

Leonard invited her for lunch in a slightly embarrassing way that she hoped she'll be over it by the time she sits down to eat. She had a bit of revenge by sending Leonard to fetch her things from her ex-boyfriend, Kurt. Hard to believe he'd actually gone through with it. She was expecting him to retreat when he see the build of her ex. Poor Sheldon, he wasn't even supposed to be there. Both of them had a reminder of high school when Kurt pantsed them both. Turns out Sheldon skipped all of that by going straight to college. He must've missed his sex-ed class as well.

With both of them gone, she had been introduced to more geeky paraphernalia. Wolowitz supposedly had praised her in 5 different languages, and Raj never responded to any of her queries. He was a silent guy, hiding behind the wordy Howard.

ii

Five months at the place and she hasn't gotten far with the little boy in that tall body. He seems to be living in his own world where they practiced literal laws and forgotten social niceties. As if he wasn't quite human. Except that he actually is a human, and reacted appropriately to certain situations. There was that time when a bird flew into his apartment, and he had run into hers because, _'My apartment doesn't have avian creatures, therefore it isn't my apartment, and I'm staying here till it turns back to my apartment.' _ Turns out he had hidden a sleeping bag somewhere in her apartment and proceeded to nap in the living room, even after she tried persuading him that the couch would be more comfortable. Leonard had been away that night because of some science discussion in Oregon or he would've removed the bird from the apartment. She didn't bother with it because she was curious if he'd really stay in her supposedly disorganized heap called Penny's Sanctuary.

That was how she was convinced he wasn't a total robot.

_I'm pretty sure robots wouldn't give a crap if a bird flew into their place. They're logical beings with yes no functions, not 'oh my god there's a bird in my apartment! Abandon shiiiiiip!'_

iii

Sheldon had prowled back from his apartment to sneak in the laptop when Leonard walked up the stairs to their floor.

"Sheldon, what the hell are you doing in Penny's apartment at 9?!"Leonard had yelped when he came back from the meeting and found the apartment empty. Whether he said it in a jealous or confused tone, it was hard to tell. His voice was rather whiny most of the time. "She doesn't even wake at 10!"

"Hey, I'm awake!" I said, popping out from my apartment at the sound of that accusation. Okay, so I love to sleep in. But I didn't sleep in today! Shows what you know, short stuff.

"Oh, hi, Penny. Didn't know you're up." he gave Sheldon a disapproving glance. Sheldon sent a puzzled look back. The expression was rather cute_. If I didn't know any better I would've thought Leonard had a little something for Sheldon. But I know it was just me he was thinking of, since he kept trying not to stare at me too long except he was doing it awkwardly. Wonder why he's being so obvious._

"Thanks to Sheldon here, who woke up at five thirty, made some noise at seven and gave me a nice breakfast for not complaining when he needed to bunk here." _Actually, I think he only bunked with me because he wasn't used to being by himself after having a room-mate for so long. Not that I'm going to tell him that. _

"Thick, rich, warm blended Coffee can wake me at 8 anytime." I winked at him. Leonard went into the apartment to put his luggage back.

"Don't get used to it Penny, it's only for today." Sheldon reminded me.

"Darn. What if I let you bunk with me again?" Oops, wrong words. Leonard had appeared and he looks rather unhappy with the direction of the plot. "Just kidding! We'd end up killing each other. Probably with spoons! Or the TV remote."

"Don't be ridiculous, Penny. Spoons and remotes are not made for that purpose." Sheldon deadpanned.

"Sheldon, I see some bird poop at your table." Leonard had interrupted the easy chatter with that line, and Sheldon had turned into a berserker with his anti-bacterial weapon.

I can still hear his cries of "Die, you evil stain on my perpetually clean furniture! Die die die!"

It's actually very entertaining to see other people clean.

iv

A string of disappointing boyfriends later, Leonard asked me out. I was ready for a change at that time, and it wasn't a bad idea at that time. I told him I need some time to think about it though, because of Sheldon. Wouldn't the group dynamics be blown off by the change?

Maybe if he has a girlfriend too, then the change wouldn't be that crazy. Or would it be worst if that happened? It's rather hard to tell.

Either way, I planned to search for someone to balance the equation. Did I just use a math joke? I think I did! All that physicist influence must be doing a number on my vocabulary. I must've ate a thesaurus when I met these guys, just so I can understand their conversations.

Back to the problem, a date for the lovely, neurotic Sheldon and his idiosyncrasies.

If I were to get a similarly afflicted with emotional stunt and logical girl, they are never going anywhere. Both of them would be marooned in their isolation and enjoy it. Being a friend of Sheldon, I think that's a waste of all that jokes and sarcasm. He deserves someone who would teach him how to navigate through social situations, understand his problems, is straight forward when dealing with his shortcomings and will honestly tell him in private when he's being an embarrassment instead of publically shaming him. That way, he might enjoy the subtle exchanges and intellectual socializing. His girlfriend has got to know what he's talking about. Where can I find someone perfect like that?!

Face meets palm.

Facebook might shortlist some people. I know! I'll recruit Leonard and his friends! How about Bernadette? Is she the type of person that would fit Sheldon?

I guess I'll have to set up a field test.

v

I had invited them over to watch Chuck on my big flat-screen TV. It was a series that had lots of techno-babble in it I thought they would enjoy the science a bit. On second thought, this might be the worst series to choose from a bunch of science action series. Perhaps Fringe would be better?

"The problem about these action series isn't the story. It's the logic within the story line that makes me more than a little doubtful on the legitimacy of the claim that one long view of a movie could transfer so many images into someone's mind." Sheldon ranted his logical fallacy what not's.

"It's a show targeted for a large audience. People who watch these aren't expecting the plot to be difficult to grasp or follow the logics of a neuroscientist. They didn't hire professionals to validate the possibilities of what was inflicted on the main character to be within the abilities of the technology of this age."

_Don't encourage him, Leonard! Le Nerd! The nerd! Aha! Oh, wait, wrong train of thought._

"There was that part when she showed him the bomb and he accepts it without a single question that it could be wrong. When proved to be a wrong assumption, he runs into danger again... and revealed that he didn't trust her to her face. He need some acting classes. Or is it better if he has rudimentary psychology... "

"The voice of the narrator is awesome." I said to derail the topic. _Oh, shut up the both of you, I'm trying to enjoy the show, not a debate_!

"Penny, that isn't a valid argument." I glared at Sheldon, who snaps his mouth shut. Leonard seems to receive message when Sheldon turned to stare at the screen, his mouth moving soundlessly. Probably running a scathing commentary about how all the science in the series was unsupported or something.

The day passed somewhat better when the episode ends and I switched to Star Trek. They never complain about how teleportation doesn't exist or ships that big can't float or something. Odd. And probably because everyone knows that the stuff in Star Trek is made of dreams.

Bernadette knocked on the door at the moment the huge ship hovered into the screen.

I jumped up to get the door, knowing that the boys would be watching the movie like a hawk. Bernadette came in and saw that I had started Star Trek without her.

"Oh, it's Star Trek for today? I should've gotten here earlier!"

Both of the boys turned to look at her, distracted by the new voice.

"Who is it?"

"This is Bernadette, Bernadette, these are my neighbours! The tall one in the red shirt is Sheldon and the one with glasses and hoodie is Leonard."

"Oh. Hi, Bernadette." Leonard greeted. Sheldon turned back to Star Trek after a quick glance to make sure she wasn't armed. Hmm, nothing beats Star Trek in terms of importance, eh?

There was a vacated seat next to Sheldon, and another next to Leonard. I left it to chance and went to get some drinks for Bernie.

"What drink would you like, Bernie?"

"What do you have?"

"OJ, coffee, milk, chocolate, water and wine."

"Milk's okay." I picked up the carton and poured some into a cup for her and got myself some hot chocolate.

Sheldon must've heard her reply because he was mumbling about milk being inappropriate when watching a movie when I passed him by. Bernadette had sat next to Leonard. Darn, she didn't sit next to Sheldon because he was being dismissive earlier. Leonard, being the gentleman he is, had the tendency to cower in the presence of potential girl-friend material.

The lights went out. I might've timed the field test date to clash with the electric maintenance at the apartments. I even hid a copy of the black-out announcement from my nerdy neighbours.

Two yelps and a gasp. Maybe I should've made a surprised sound but without proper lighting they can't see me laughing at them.

A/N:Chapter edited on 20th July because I had changed some terms.


	2. Chapter 2: Observations of Sheldon

Disclaimer: Big bang Theory...not mine. I didn't even came up with anything science related.

Part two

The Observations of Sheldon

(Told from Sheldon's Point of View)

Nobody in America believes in pure love anymore. Or at least that's what it seems. They now subscribe to True Blood, Vampire Diaries and Twilight for their dose of romance. I tried understanding the female mind by taking apart the story and noted down points where the couples started liking each other, but the numerous sexual innuendoes, boredom and illogical plot progression had put me off them repeatedly. Pure love is mostly dead. Besides, I wasn't going to be waylaid by these flights of fancies and forget about The Work. What those plebeians call 'Sciency stuff'.

It was on a late Friday when Penny had decided to pop in again because her coffee had ran out.

We were having our Vintage Game Night, replaying Legend of Zelda on the gameboy colours.

"But there's only two gameboys!"Howard complained.

"Both of your laptops have emulators." I said. "You can still join us in exploring Hyrule."

"It's not the same, both of you are on your gameboys and we're on imitations!"

"Zelda waits for her heroes!" Raj didn't care if he was on a real game boy or a laptop. And the laptop has a higher resolution anyway.

"Bu-"

"Hey, have a cracker, won't you?" between the grumblings, Penny had appeared and settled them down and gave him a cracker.

It was illogical, a stray thought that came from nowhere, when I wished she would be there even at the age of forty-five. Why forty-five? Was there significance in that number? And does her presence at that age mean something? The words my mam told me when I was 18 came to me.

_"Sheldon, I want you to promise me if you were to find a gal you really like, don't let her go."_

I could see her somewhere in the pictures, us growing old together, which is rather scary. When did that happen? Was it all the times she invaded the apartment and made me so angry for her differences? Was it the force of her personality which could convince anyone to believe her? No, that didn't make sense, if she had been so charismatic she'd be famous. There was the times when she'd drop her things to help me- when I was sick, when she try to explain the social norms and she had took me to shop for things... _flights of fancies! think of the work! The work I haven't done!_

Somehow I was caught in the conundrum known as Penny, and had assigned time to try and figure her out.

I don't know what she's doing here. Sure, she's here for the Wi-Fi, free Pad Thai and crashing Halo nights. But what is she doing here? Hanging out with geeks on the days she have no work, run out of something and needs it- sugar, salt, spice, pepper, or just popping in. Was she pitying us, two guys who only had our work, games and two other friend to depend on? She was being too nice to us, which is making Leonard have false hope that there was a chance of coitus with her. Explaining why it's unlikely to happen doesn't work if she's going to be a constant fixture in our lives.

When she had invited Leonard to watch a movie at her place, I had felt resigned. There was no reason for Penny to invite me as I am more likely going to be the 'third wheel'.

Then she said, "One of my friend's coming as well, you better not scare her away, Sheldon."

"I'll try." So it wasn't going to be what Leonard think it was. Leonard's enthusiasm visibly dimmed, and he had a confused expression on his face.

"Who is it?"

"It's Bernie, I mean, Bernadette. She works at the Cheesecake factory too, but she's studying microbiology part time."

"That's impressive!" Leonard said in his fake-chipper voice.

"Are we including Raj's and Howard's participation as well?' I asked, wondering if this was in the friend category.

"They can come too, if they have time.' The event's in the friend category after all.

"They're busy." Leonard said hurriedly, not needing more competition.

"O-kay! See you on the next whatever happens Thursday." finishing her sentence, she returned to her own apartment.

"Sheldon..." Leonard tends to drag his words when he's nervous about something. Best to be quick about it.

"Yes?"

"This is probably the only chance I have to watch a movie with Penny."

"We watched Avengers, Spiderman, Ironman, Green Lantern, Captain America, the Hulk and X-men together. Did you forget last Thursday when Raj decided to invite us on a marvel movie marathon at no cost?" I had lots of popcorn. It had been great, then it was dreary because the comics were better than the movies.

"That was when all of you were there."

"And...?"

"This is different." Leonard insisted.

"How so? Her friend's going to be there." I added.

He sighed. "I guess you're right. We'll go together. And if I'm lucky, you'll be so preoccupied with Penny's friend because of some obscure reason that you won't argue about how horrible the movie was."

"I don't do that all the time." I said.

"You can't possibly do that all the time, or you would've missed all the important bits in Star Wars. Besides, you need to breathe." Leonard huffed, crossing his arms.

"Which proves my point, Thank you."

In no time at all, it was Whatever happens Thursday, and Leonard did not fuss too much on his clothes or deodorant because it was just the usual friend's hanging out together event. I rolled his eyes as he attempted to style his hair in a style reminiscent of Elvis Presley, except with less hair.

"You look worst than your usual self today." I pointed out.

He was silent. Still, he put his hair under the water for a few seconds then dried it.

"Good move. Instead of greasy hair, now it's naturally gravity defying."

"I appreciate you pointing it out, anything else you want to add?" Leonard said in a tone he had previously informed me as 'sarcasm'.

'Is that sarcasm?'

'Yes, it's sarcasm.' I decided maybe saying anything would make him more stressed instead of the opposite and I didn't have a protocol for comforting stressed friend who is thinking too much before going to the movies. Perhaps I could tell him that this is similar to going out with Raj and Howard, except that they had surgically changed their genders. As I was about to say so, I thought that Howard would make a bad Penny. And I don't know how Penny's friend is like but she isn't Asian. He finished drying his hair and I gave him a few pats on the shoulder.

"Let's go."

I nodded and left the apartment with Leonard looking as his usual self, thank heavens.

"Oh hey, guys! I've put Chuck on TV, but we can if switch it's not interesting."

Penny's apartment was cleaner than it usually is, which was pleasant. She had moved her knick-knacks into her storeroom, I assumed, peering around the living room. There were two sets of chairs, each meant for two people, a single seat in the middle and the sofa had been moved to the side, not facing the TV. I chose a seat which faced the television at an angle which doesn't force me to turn my head too much if I wanted to discuss about the series, and is still at the position which there are optimum lighting. Leonard, seeing that I had taken the best seat, opt to take the one on the other side, which is closer to the entrance and more likely for people to pass by and start conversations like, "Hi, how are you? Great?" and many pointless questions which could be noticed if they had paid more attention to their friends or followed them on twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Penny hovered somewhat between the two seats and settled at a chair in the middle, which wasn't a bad seat if you were planning to pay all your attention to the show because turning to answer someone's question would put the show out of the corner of your eyes.

Not to bore us with the details, Penny brought our attention to the show by pointing on the screen exaggeratedly, "He's going to die!"

I can see that.

An episode later, the irritation from seeing unexplainable illogical things that the main character did sparked a discussion between me and Leonard, and Penny was still watching the drivel.

"The voice of the narrator is awesome." Penny said when I was going to add a point to why the series is going to ruin America and cause a World War Three. She had a look in her eyes which promised days without proper burger at the cheesecake factory. Demoralized by the thought of that, I muttered the rest softly to prove a point- that I would've won the argument if I had continued the debate.

When the episode was over, I closed my eyes and sent telepathic messages to Penny so that she'd change it to something more palatable for intellectuals, like Terminator or Doctor Who.

"Welp," she popped the p, "let's watch something more sci-fi."

And then she switched it to Star Trek: Into the Darkness! I did a mental dance move. My superior telepathic abilities had changed her mind. Score!

Zachary Quinto was spectacular as Spock.

Knock, knock.

Penny rose from her seat and opened the door. I heard a high pitched voice of dissatisfaction and glared in the direction where the voice originated from and saw a mousy girl. Her face was framed with a pair of red rimmed glasses and blonde hair. Losing interest with the newcomer, I spun back to see that the scene had progressed and I missed precious minutes of Spock. The woman should've waited for the show to finish before making her appearance. It's as if someone walked over you when you were in the cinema.

''Who is it?"

"This is Bernadette, Bernadette, these are my neighbours! The tall one in the red shirt is Sheldon and the one with glasses and hoodie is Leonard."

"Oh. Hi, Bernadette." Leonard greeted.

I swerved, gave her a passive nod of acknowledgement and turned back to the movie.

"What drink would you like, Bernie?"

"What do you have?"

"OJ, coffee, milk, chocolate, water and wine."

"Milk's okay."

They were talking too much, distracting me from Star Trek. And then the lights went out.

There were the yelps of dying dogs, and a manly gasp. Needless for me to tell you, I gasped.

"If I was in my apartment I'd follow the protocol on page 9, 'What to do during a power outage', however, since we are not in our apartment, it's rather cumbersome to access the electric generator I have in the closet." I took out my phone and woke it from the sleeping mode, letting the screen double as a source of light.

"You have an electrical generator in your closet?" Bernadette squeaked.

"And also a small portable version of it in Leonard's car, but that's irrelevant to our current situation, we can't use them indoors- now that I think about it, their existence's rather useless in the case of power outages." Exasperated, I checked the status of the Wi-Fi to see if my apartment's electrical supply had been halted as well. "This is odd. Past experiences of blackouts in this apartment had been caused by maintenance, appliance malfunction or rainstorms. With the absence of any lighting and sounds of things fizzing, I assume this must be another scheduled maintenance, which I was informed that residents are given notice a week ahead about the inconvenience we are bound to experience."

"That reminds me of my downloads!"Leonard remembered his computer was still on. An hour ago he had started updating his software while nobody's using the internet.

"What should we do?" Penny said somewhere to my left.

"Maybe check the fuse box to see if we can fix it." Leonard said weakly. "Should I?" he volunteered. I rolled my eyes, shining the light on the floor.

"Go ahead, my experiences doesn't establish itself as firm evidence of the contrary so you're free to explore the options, which, I had already listed in the protocol."

"I have some candles," Penny stood, moving towards where her shelves were- close to the kitchen. Conveniently, the lighters were next to the candles. She lit up two of them, gave one on a cardboard to Leonard and one to Bernadette. She had decided to stay in the dark, I guessed that she's used to the layouts of her apartment so she won't have much problems going around without a source of lighting.

"Huh." I exhaled, running through a list of things I could do now.

"Bernie, how's the paper you're writing?" Penny asked, sipping her drink.

"It's going quite well, there are many aspects of the virus which we haven't cover in our research so we can't possibly run out of materials to cover." Bernadette reflected on the progress of the work.

"Unlike theoretical physics, you're just looking at the structure and stating what you see." I said smugly.

"Unlike theoretical physics it's also more practical and saves lives." she replied evenly.

"Well, it's not as if you were redefining how people view the world through the observations from your Petri dishes." I snapped.

"Sheldon, there are no reasons why you should antagonize her." Penny butted in.

"She was mocking my favourite subject!"

"Just as you were mocking hers in the beginning."

"Actually, it's kind of fun to argue about the finer points of our favourite subjects. Reminds me of why I chose microbiology." Say what you will, this girl doesn't give up easy. I'll give her a point in her favour.

"It's no good- they're all fine." Leonard placed the candle by the tables where most of the cups and saucers were. "I must've forgotten about the notice. What did I miss?"

"You might have forgotten the notice, but I would've put it in the mental planner. And you missed nothing noteworthy." I checked the time. Nine fifty. Ten minutes wasted on a debate, and no points won.

"Psst-What's a mental planner?" Bernadette asked Leonard as he sat down in his original seat.

"A planner that only the mentally ill would have," Leonard joked.

"You mean mentally superior." I corrected.

Penny snickered. Did she just took their side? Or was she merely joining in the merry-making these jokers had started? "I'm sorry about the blackout." she said suddenly. "I think I did see a notice downstairs but I must've forgotten to tell you two about it. I hardly remembered it myself."

"It's okay." Both of them replied.

"No it isn't. It's a duty for us, as residents to be alert of these things. I imagine you'd forget the earthquake notice that would've spelled our doom should we not evacuate in time." I stood with my mobile in hand.

"Where are you going?"Penny, startled, stood as well.

"Back to my apartment. Going to switch off the electrical appliances properly."

"Oh, yeah." Leonard responded, almost forgetting about the computer himself. But he shook his head, saying "It's no hurry."

"I don't like doing things half-way. I'll bring the laptop so we can continue the movie."

"Great idea!"

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"Penny."

"Why aren't you opening the door?" Bernadette's voice travelled from inside the apartment.

"Waiting for it."

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"Penny."

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"Penny."

Pause. The door opens. "So you got the lappy?" Penny's holding a candle, her face lit in a way I could only describe as photoshop-ed, or pretty. An urge to write poems welled up from somewhere.

"Now we can continue watching Star Trek." I smiled, stomping down the silly urge to wax poetry.

They had moved to the sofa while I went to retrieve the laptop and placed a table in front of it. I plopped down to the empty space at the side and passed my laptop to Penny, who had seated herself beside Bernadette.

The four of us cramped on a sofa to watch Star Trek from a tiny screen. I could've brought an extra laptop, but the acoustics would've been ruined. In between the movie and the ending, the power came back, but we were engrossed in the chase between Khan and Kirk.

"No! He's dying!" I must've heard this before because I felt a tick at the mention of 'dying'. I shushed her while trying not to cry at the emotional scene.

I'm Spock. Spock doesn't cry unless if it's an extremely distressing situations. Character deaths are extremely distressing. I went to the toilet as the credits rolled.

A/N: Thank you for the feedback and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Will definitely be updated in another month. If you are lucky, within next week, I've gotten a thousand words into the next chapter. Hurr. By the way, I don't write any smut for TBBT at all. Nothing explicit will ever be in anything I post here, just to clarify if you are expecting sexy times- you are more likely to see fluff and friendships. Chances are that the next part(chapter) will be the last. Not very definite, but likely. Now that I think about it, this chapter is rather filler-ish, so I'll up another one by next week. :)


	3. Chapter 3: Post-Test One

Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to TBBT. 

Part Three

**Back to Penny's point of view.**

Post Mortem of Field Test One

Okay, so my plan wasn't really a good plan. It was simply a 'get together with friends and hope they'll like each other enough to start dating' plan. And I even gave them a prime opportunity to get to know each other! What's more romantic than sharing a candle in the dark together? Then Sheldon had to whip out his phone, use it as a torchlight, as well as checking if there's Wi-Fi signal, which tells him the status of his apartment's power.

...mood killed.

Not to mention the snarky, '_Hello, I'm professor Snape and I don't like people._' attitude. Was he that annoying when I first met him? Hm, maybe he was a little too straight-forward, but it wasn't as if he had closed himself off. Maybe the sudden end of movie was putting him in a bad mood.

Note taken: Do not turn off a movie half-way when Sheldon is watching. Especially if it's in the sci-fi genre.

After an awkward bickering from the resident snarky, Leonard came back, and the tension had bled out. Sheldon exited, and I thought he would've went to his bed early to sleep through the blackout, like normal people would. There were a few minutes of silence with Leonard, who had struggled valiantly for ten minutes to come up with a conversation. I pushed the table so that it was in front of the sofa.

"Get over here, guys. The sofa's nicer if we're really going to watch Star Trek on the laptop."

Few minutes later, Sheldon returned with his laptop, a gleeful expression stuck on his face. Why? I don't know. Sheldon had always been a little loopy. In a good way. The closest bet was he could continue his Star Trek worshipping by watching it.

Field Test Summary: The field test one had failed to achieve its objective, yet I had gained some grounds in integrating Sheldon into more normal socializing. I'm kind of proud he didn't bail on us, because it would've been an awkward long time if he did.

With this said, on to Field Test no.2. I think I have a better understanding of how to set up a field test with the experience behind the first one. Don't interrupt what they're doing- even if it's to create a nice atmosphere for romantic reasons. Guys, they don't understand how we read the mood anyways. By the end of these field tests, I think I can start my own dating services for singles with social anxiety.

The major roadblock of the second test was the 'who' am I going to involve in it. Seeing as Bernadette and Sheldon wasn't going to hit it off without a reason with a second meeting, I'd invite her for the normal gatherings- perhaps she'd like to see Leonard, or meet Howard and Raj. Personally, I find Raj rather endearing. The only reason why he ends up single is because of his nervousness around girls, and for Howard... his shamelessness is his downfall. Howard flirts with anything with the right equipments, which makes the other girls feel as if he isn't taking them seriously.

He isn't- is he?

_In the cheesecake factory_

I wiped the tables down and saw Bernie going for her break. "Bernadette, what do you think about the boys?"

"Hm, I thought Sheldon was rather stand-offish at the start. At the end he was rather nice." she said, smoothing her hair down. "Leonard was trying a little too hard but he's courteous."

"Yeah, first impressions of them tend to be that way. When we first met and I asked what they did for fun, he said they were masturbating for cash! Turns out they were thinking of donating their sperm but changed their minds at the end. You get used to the weirdness after awhile." I laughed, because I remembered all those bizarre things, us fighting since we were both stubborn individuals who couldn't compromise over anything.

"How long was that?"

"Around one to two years." I replied.

"Wow."

"I know, a long crazy year, and another that seemed less crazier because it can't get any more crazy than that."

"It sounds like fun though." She said wistfully.

"You can join us on the regular days, they're less crazy compared to the special days when that someone doesn't get his way."

"Really? I'll consider it." a customer entered the restaurant as she finished saying this. I grabbed my notepad and pen.

"Great! Text or call so I can tell them you're popping in when you do."

The seed of a beginning planted in the innocent's head, I returned to my duties, taking the orders from customers.

...

Typical Days

Reet! Reet! Reet!

Boom!

"Perish, rats!" Sheldon casts Firestorm and then a Fireball spell. The nest exploded.

"You're hogging the nests!" Leonard's protests were ignored.

"Well, kill those rats then! They're everywhere. Where's Sir Howard and Rajesh?"

"We're busy killing stuff nearby!" Howard's voice came from the back of the sofa.

"They were lured away by those ninja lookalikes that wield Paraiba*."

"Supposedly they have better drop rates. The experience from killing these rats is rather unsatisfactory. Let's go and kill some of the bandits before there's none left."

"We can always reroll the world." Howard said.

"Yeah, but I like this map! The warps are all near the middle of the map, making it easier for travelling. I'm out of those warping scrolls."

"I can trade some of mine for your identification scrolls if you want." Sheldon offered.

"I'm out of those too." Sheldon gave him a disappointed look, as if to say 'why would you run out of everything?'.

"It's not my fault my level's too low for me to see the equips!"

"If you have patience, then you wouldn't be running out of supplies. We'll refresh our supplies in ten minutes. I'll open the portal."

Ten more minutes of explosions and bandits splattering everywhere, Sheldon used one of the warp scrolls.

"R, H, we're going to town. Be back in ten minutes top."

"Okie Dokey."

"Roger that. Get me some red pots while you're at it, will you."

"Sure, H. How many?"Leonard moved to the merchants.

"Around 200 to 300. Any number in between works. Thanks."

"That's a lot. Are you fighting something beyond your level again?"

"No, my armour rating sucks. Raj, anything good for an outlander in your inventory?"

"I have an ugly top with a add six dexterity stat, if you want it."

"Ugly or not as long it's got good physical armour ratings. I've got the rings to fix my elemental resistance."

"It has 38 Physical Armour."

"Eh, still better than this level 10 junk I have."

"Hey guys, Bernadette's going to join us on the next week's dinner, is that ok?" Penny said as she poked her head into the apartment from the doorway.

"Not good. I'm dying." was Howard's confusing reply as his face was lit green by his laptop screen. "Raj, I need some help here. Stop picking up gold and help me kill the sand golem."

No answer from the resident shy guy.

"Uhh, guys?" Penny called again, hoping for their attention.

"Come back in an hour!" Sheldon announced.

"What's that game?"

"It's T2." Leonard answered. "I mean, Torchlight 2, but the name wouldn't tell you anything about the game-play. Raj thought I was talking about a torchlight with a number on it when I told him about it."

"Hmm, no more space for another player, I take." Penny stared at their laptop screens.

"No." came Sheldon's short reply.

"You can replace me if you want, I'm kind of tired after playing for 3 hours straight." Leonard said.

"You did not play for 3 hours straight. Only I did. You went to the toilet twice, Raj went to Facebook to update on his character's level and uploaded a screenshot of his ridiculously lousy equipments and Howard went out for a few minutes and came back with a silly expression." Sheldon corrected him.

"Hey, there was a pretty lady in Penny's laptop so I'm entitled to looking besotted."

"Besotted. Have you ran out of words to use or were you that desperate for a word to describe your expression?" Scoffing, Sheldon brought up the skill panel and added more points to fire storm and cast it on the purple brutes.

"I can only wonder how you manage to slay those netherworld creatures while keeping up with the conversation in a Sheldon-y way."

"I'm Sheldon, of course I can converse in a way which is unique to me." Sheldon sent him a baffled gawk, turning from the screen for a moment.

"And you're still killing the mob while doing it."

"Anyone not okay with my friend crashing our dinner?"

"Yes, I have a question," Since Penny showed no signs of leaving soon, Sheldon finally addressed Penny, however condescendingly it may sound. "Will this be a permanent arrangement, or is this on a trial basis? This inviting people over thing."

"Sheldon, in some worlds, bringing friends over is called socializing. Coincidentally, this is that world. Socializing not a service that has a 'trial basis', psychological pricing or an expiry date. Socializing is normal for a human being." Penny sighed at the fact that she had to elaborate on that instead of what kind of fun things they'd do other than dinner. Then again, she's talking to Sheldon.

"Fine, bring them over. As many of your friends as you like. I'll get to exercise the muscle I rather not use."

"And what muscle is that?" Howard asked, curious if Sheldon had actually made a dirty joke.

"The part of my brain that deals with socializing. Why do you ask in that tone you often use to make those inappropriate comments?" Sheldon frowned as his embermage was swarmed by tiny bugs that explode.

"Oh, you don't want to know, Sheldon." Leonard said. Raj nodded soundlessly to agree with Leonard.

...

Mondays

"Bernadette, this is Rajesh Koothrapali and Howard Wolowitz."

"Hello, gorgeous."

"Thank you. You must be Howard. And you are..."Bernadette smiled at the silent man beside Howard.

An awkward pause as she waited for him to introduce himself. Penny intervened quickly, "Raj, we call him Raj."

"Sorry, not very sure about it. Sometimes Asians prefer being addressed by their family names."

Rajesh could only stare quietly at her.

"Is he..."

"No, he's just shy." Rajesh nodded sadly.

"Welcome to our Monday gathering at Sheldon and Leonard's apartment. We also eat at the Cheesecake factory every Thursday, although I've never seen you around the time we hang out there."

"Her shift's not at that time," Penny explained.

"Ah. Pity." Howard dug into his peanut-less meal.

As if knowing what Howard was thinking, Sheldon marveled at his meal. "Mee krob, satay with extra peanut sauce. Mmm."

"I brought some Chinese takeaway," Bernadette lifted a container which had a bio-hazard sign at the corner.

"Is that what I think it is?"

"Oh, I bought this for the lab but it turns out they had enough equipments so I use it for takeaways now." Bernadette flipped the latch and opened it. Smell of won ton wafted out from the container.

"And I thought she brought us a sample of Ebola to study. Rather alarming to put food in a canister labelled to contain dangerous biological specimens."

"We're physicists and engineers, not microbiologists." Howard said to Sheldon.

"Ah, but haven't you wondered if you had grown up to be a biologist instead of physicist?"

"What does that have to do with Ebola?" Penny interjected.

"We're having dinner...best not to talk about Ebola." Leonard changed the topic, seeing as it was a dead end and was ruining his appetite.

"Right, right."

"Hey, can I trade a prawn with your won ton?" Penny waved a prawn at Bernadette.

"Sure, I had them pack extras. The Chinese takeout near my university is really good at making won ton."

"Is that the only food they sell?" Leonard asked, curious.

"They also have various side dishes and chicken rice." she elaborated.

"Hmm."

"Anything interesting at Caltech recently?" Penny set down her cup and asked the guys.

"Ah, our research got extra funding after the recent social event Leonard went to. He had to sit next to retired professors and listen to them babble about theories which have been disproved for hours. As a result, those old geezers were impressed by how polite the people at Caltech are and gave us more donation than the year before. Which is why he deserved a memorabilia I've been keeping for some time for special events- I present you, the Staff of Gandalf." Sheldon revealed an oak staff from the back of the sofa.

"What event were you thinking of? LOTR day?" Penny laughed.

"Sheldon, you don't have to." Leonard grimaced.

"I insist."

"I'm too short to cosplay as Gandalf."

"Oh. I forgot. Still, you could always say you're a dwarf mage, not Gandalf."

"I hardly think dwarf mages would carry sticks longer than them, but okay, I'll keep that with the rest of my LOTR stash." Leonard conceded, leaning it against the sofa for the time being.

"What do you have besides the staff you just acquired? " Bernadette questioned.

"It's just the complete set of books, some games and costumes. Most would consider that a stash."

"Hmm, I suppose."

"And due to the increase in funding, we're going to get an additional member for our department."

"You've already interviewed the potential candidates?" Bernadette sipped her drink.

"I have yet to get to that part, but yes, we'll be having them around next week. I can't wait to hand over half of the equations I haven't got around to complete."

"They're likely not going to finish them without any mistakes, you're fine with that?"

"Now that you've mentioned it...I guess I should finish them on my own." Sheldon concluded sadly.

Sheldon, Howard and Raj finishes their food and clears the boxes up. Penny cleans up her plate as well. Leonard and Bernadette chewed slowly. A few minutes later, they were all cleared up.

*Speaking of Paraiba, you might've heard of it from some RPG games. From what I remembered it's similar to a cutlass and it was in the Final Fantasy Tactics Advance on the Nintendo game boy advance, unless if my memory's all wonky. If I'm wrong it shouldn't matter much in the long run, I'm just referring to other games.

Chapter notes: Fanfiction doesn't like it when people do the knock three times joke, so they shortened mine. It also explains why there was a '.knock.' in the previous chapter. Thank you for the encouragements! It's unfortunate I couldn't come up with something 'Shenny' in this chapter, and it seemed out of place if I try to force it. Finally had a flamer (My first flamer! How romantic can that be?) who posted a review that doesn't point out how I should improve my writing. This chapter probably contain several wrong information on Torchlight 2, the terms they use since most of them are generic game terms like pot(potion) or warp scroll(I think they call it differently, but I don't recall it now and I doubt Raj or Howard cares if it's not accurate as long as people get what they're talking about).

Signing out, 'toss me out'.


	4. Chapter 4: Start of the Rain

Disclaimer: I do not own the big bang theory. I'm only writing this while it's not airing and I don't feel like waiting for the episodes. If you don't like reading this, you may stop. :3

Chapter 4: The start of the rain

**Parking Lot**

Penny seemed troubled, sitting at the front seat of her red car.

"Darn, it seems like Sheldon was right after all."

The next day

Leonard and Sheldon's Apartment

"Leonard, would it be possi- whoo-"

Penny falls down with a loud smack by her butt. "-pse!"

"This isn't a good time for you to drop by." Leonard gestured at Sheldon. "I forgot to tell you that today's Sheldon ultimate clean up day. He takes a day of every year, just like the Chinese during Chinese New Year, and wipes every single surface available in the apartment and rearranges his comic books in a new system. He even bleaches the coins in the piggy bank to detoxify them."

"Penny," Sheldon greets her after he slides his face mask down, only to sneeze twice. "What were you saying earlier?"

"Ouch, gimme a moment." Leonard helps her up and seated her in the only seat not covered in paper. "I was asking if it's possible if I hitch a ride with the two of you to get to work. My car broke down yesterday."

Sheldon paused to think of a response. "We leave before 9 a.m."

"I'll wake up early."

"You can come with us. Sheldon, you do remember that she patiently drove you to the supermarket and the dentist last time. Think of this as your way of paying her back." Leonard tried reasoning with him.

"It's not that I don't remember those instances. As a matter of fact, I remember them quite well as they are novel experiences. I figured that including her in the morning routine would put a wrench in our schedule. It's as if we're playing Left 4 Dead with an extra luggage. Not the Discworld sort of luggage, I might add."

"Discworld?"Penny asked, her pain temporarily forgotten.

"It's a series of fantasy storybooks written by Terry Pratchett about adventures of a few people who are considered in the main cast such as Rincewind, a wizard, Death, Tiffany Aching, Carrot and Moist." Sheldon described the characters in detail, except he didn't bring up the previous subject.

"That doesn't explain the luggage."

"The Luggage in Discworld attacks people." Leonard added.

"Oh." Penny stood. "You mean I'm worst than a useless luggage?"

"Also a distraction for Leonard."

"You're a distraction too, wanting to play shiritori, guessing games and fun facts on the road."

"I'm ensuring you're not sleepy while driving."

"What? They're boring!" Leonard groaned at the thought of the activities Sheldon consider as games.

"Okay, Sheldon, since you said I'm useless, I'll come up with ways to make the drive there interesting."

"But that's my job!"

"You do a bad job of it, really. Penny would be more entertaining, even if she doesn't know all that stuff you memorized at least she knows what interests normal people."

"We'll see."

**Morning. In the car on the way to the Cheesecake Factory.**

"So Julian took a goblet of wine nearby to try and stop the fire, and guess what happened?"

"He didn't!" Leonard snickered.

"Yup, the fire grew bigger and it spread to the tablecloths, his shirt, and the stricken waiter. They should've ordered grape juice. Not that anyone knew the candle was going to fall at that unfortunate moment. It really fits the 'backfired ' term perfectly."

"That was funny! Wasn't it funny, Sheldon?"

"No it wasn't. Imagining a person's gloved hand melting from the flames doesn't make me laugh." Sheldon moped from being unable to tell his jokes like usual. Penny kept cutting his sentence off and he gave up when he noticed Leonard had preferred her stories. "Something's off."

"What is it?" Penny piped up from the back.

"The car isn't balanced. Now that there's three people in the seats, the car is slanted toward the left side where she sits."

"You can feel that?" Penny shifted to the middle seat.

"I don't need to feel it, I know it. The car wheels are going to misalign itself if this continues."

"Are you sure it's not due to your need for a fixed routine that's making you utter rubbish claims at the moment?" Leonard checks the rear-view mirror as he said this.

"Darn, I was hoping you wouldn't notice that the only way for that to happen was if she'd sit on one corner forever and weight more than a tonne."

"Nope, didn't imagine that at all, but thanks for the explanation." Leonard said as he stopped at a traffic light.

"I'm going to be too early at my workplace... argh. Should've not chosen the performing arts course."

"Penny, you'd rather be someone you don't like than to choose your own path? If you didn't choose the performing arts course, you wouldn't be here, and we wouldn't know each other. I believe your choice wasn't that bad, considering that you are now associated with three PhD holders and one on their way to being a PhD holder."Sheldon said, craning back to see her expression.

"And who might you be talking about? Howard, perhaps?"

"No, silly, I'm talking about Bernadette. We had a lengthy discussion on the pros over the installation of a sliding door over a door triggered to open by motion sensor and I find her highly knowledgeable in many areas- not only the doors. I'll bet she's even cleverer than him. She'll sooner be a PhD holder than Wolowitz."

"Howard isn't in any rush to earn his PhD. He's rather busy ogling women. The most he'd get out of it is a raise and never getting called the only one without a PhD by his peers."

"I don't have one either." Penny mumbled.

Sheldon gave her a pointed look.

"It might be odd, but not everyone needs a PhD. Seeing as your goals are to achieve popularity through acting, a PhD isn't part of your plan. It's tiring and there are lots of paperwork to go through, just for the paper to state that you've earned it."

"Did you regret it?"

"No."

"Neither did I." Leonard chimed in. "A PhD grants you many privileges. One of which is having the paper which tells others that you know more than they do."

"I don't need a paper to prove that." Sheldon huffed.

"Penny, we're at the Cheesecake Factory."

"That was quick! Time flies, gotta go, boys. Thanks!" Penny hopped out and waved till they were away.

Leonard turned to smirk at Sheldon. "Nothing bad happened."

"We're lucky this morning."

"And we'll be lucky for the rest of the day. Three is a good number."

"Three blind mice, the three musketeers, the third eye, the three magical artefacts in Harry Potter, the trinisette in Katekyou Hitman Reborn, the triforce in The Legend of Zelda, the three bears in Goldilocks-"

"If you stop breathing to name everything you know that's in threes, I'm not going to give you CPR." Leonard promised as he was making a turn at the junction.

Sheldon sent him an alarmed look and stopped to take a breath in. "I wasn't going to faint. There are so many examples I could name when you spoke of three's. Two establishes a pattern. Three breaks it. It's a common writing technique, even from a long time ago. It is rather useless for a scientist, unless if they are trying to validate their own theories by examining their data from different viewpoints, which is considered good practice habits."

"She's good at telling jokes, and a better entertainment than you are."

"Yes, but I am more loyal than she is. Women are frivolous creatures. Most men are as well, but there are some I consider better than others." he looked out of the windows, catching sight of people on the streets and frowning.

"High chance of rain today."

**After work**

"Tried getting off work early today, but boss won't let me. Looks like you guys gotta wait half an hour till I get off my shift."

"That's fine, our meals takes around half an hour anyways."

"By the way, what's with the hairstyle?"

"Rain." Leonard said, as if it explains why all of them had slicked back hair that night.

At her baffled look, Howard added, "Heavy rain."

"Extreme rain." Raj continued after a sip of his beer.

"Okay, the same sort of dinner then. I'll go and tell them you're here."

"Wait, Penny! I don't feel like having my usual today. I'll go with whatever's most popular today."

"If you say so." Penny went to inform the kitchen staff.

"Why are we here on a Wednesday anyways? I thought we only eat here on a Tuesday?" Howard couldn't resist asking when Sheldon looked as if he was ready to bolt at the first sign of danger.

"Penny."

"Oh. She's go the both of you wrapped around her hands, hasn't she?"

"No, she just needs a ride." Leonard huffed.

"I can give her a ride."

"Not that kind of ride."

Pfft. Raj spilled some beer on the table.

"I was being sincere."

"When you're being sincerely well meaning and not oozing innuendos, the sky cries. I think we'll get her home unmolested."

"Hey! I'm not that bad. Besides, I'm more interested of Bernadette right now."

"What? When did that happen?"

"When I saw her on my way to your apartment."

"You were there on Movie night?"

"What movie night? Marvel marathon?" Howard ventured. He didn't remember seeing the blond on that night.

"It seems like Leonard was referring to the night the lights went out during Star Trek: Into Darkness. I haven't filed the complaint to the manager. Hm...might that blackout be caused by the Darkness in the movie we were watching?" Sheldon mused.

"Leonard, why haven't I heard of this?" Raj said as he missed an opportunity to hang out with the two of them on that day and had to make do with crashing a few parties with Howard. None of the girls had been impressed with Howard's antics and they had been 'escorted' out of few a of the clubs.

"Penny invited the two of us over, not including the two of you." Leonard answered defensively.

"What invited who?" Penny asked as she passed by.

"Nothing." he looked for something else more interesting. When seeing nothing, he said Sheldon's name. He could always come up with something totally unrelated to the topic being discussed. Except, for once, Sheldon seemed to have followed the discussion.

"Leonard is in a fix."

"Okay, what's the problem?"

"If you leave now, everything will be fine," Sheldon answered honestly. His eye blinked a little too much, but Penny decided that the problem wasn't worth knowing. Most of the times, this was true.

"Right...if you say so." Penny retreated into the back of the restaurant to pass the orders.

"That was the first time someone bought the change of topic. I thought it was rather forced."

"You're not the only one thinking it was,"

"It works. Maybe I can try this on my students tomorrow." Sheldon considered.

"It won't work on them." Howard smirked and scouted for ladies.

"I just need more practice. Leonard, can you help me with this 'changing the topic' so that I can refute your mistakes should you make any?"

"You're probably going to make us change the topic whenever you don't like where the discussion is going if I taught you that." Leonard reasoned.

"Rats."

"What? Where?" Raj asked, horrified of dirty animals in a restaurant.

"Hey, it works."

"Of course it works, we're in the cheesecake factory, it makes sense that people would be afraid that rats would raid the place because of all those conditioning we got when we watched children programs on the television which showed mouse that love cheese and rats remind them of that."

"And now you have told him how people think and he's going to learn more and brainwash us! It's bad enough that he tried the Pavlov trick last year!" Howard complained.

"But it got us dates with girls." Raj reminded Howard of how they ended up in a party.

"In the short term, it was great." A satisfied look in Howards face and a short pause of remembering the pleasant bits. "We almost got turned into Sheldon's minions!"

"It was a great experiment. I even wrote up a report for Leonard's mom to inspect. She said it was interesting, and had plans for replication studies but told me I should put more effort on the social impact of the study."

"You wrote to my mom about that? Sheldon!"

"She said if anything noteworthy happened that relates to her field and you I can send it over, so I did."

"She's using you to get more data! About us!"

"Because I am highly intelligent and anything I find important could be used to improve their experimentation."

"You got brainwashed into being her lackey by her praises huh."

"Well, never said Sheldon was invulnerable to words that makes his ego balloon."

"If I were that egoistic, and I assure you I'm not, I wouldn't have any friends. The proof suggests I am just resistant to change."

Leonard sighed. "You do know that adaptability is important for survival."

"Which is why we are here, today, on a day we usually don't have dinner at the Cheesecake factory." Sheldon replied easily.

"Arguing with him is infuriating."

"It's like talking to a wall." Raj added.

" You should know, you've been living with him for years and you're still sane." Howard saw a busty brunette enter the restaurant with her soaked clothes. Oy vey, those melons deserve a tapping.

"I don't think so... I think I went insane a few years ago. Why else am I still living there?"

A/N: Classes are starting up again, and due to the fact that I have extra classes, I am probably going to take this a little easily, so less updates and so on. Another Sheldon centric chapter. I'm dying from thinking of what to write! D: Writers block sucks. I had an alternate chapter which I scrapped.


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